Rosalio Munoz: CPUSA program hit mark

The attached photos are of marchers at the Nov.5 “Yesterday we voted, today we march” demonstration of the Fast for Our Future in downtown Los Angeles to celebrate the election victory where supporters of immigrant rights helped change the course of our country. Scores of marchers carried with them the Communist Party USA's 2008 election program as do the marchers in the photos.

The CPUSA called for a landslide victory over the right wing Republicans in the summer of 2007 with its report "On the Road Again" initiated by Chair Sam Webb.

After John McCain became the presumptive Republican during the primaries the party discussed and approved an election programmed prepared by its Political Action Commission chaired by Joelle Fishman. Webb and Fishman cooperated with the PWW in preparing these excerpts.

-- Rosalio Munoz



Reprinted below are excerpts from Communist Party USA 2008 Election Program “Help Make History, turn Our Country Around,” published in May 2008. This program was widely distributed as part of the coalition effort to change the political direction of our country. It offers a framework for the ongoing movement, post election, and the development of solutions to meet the financial and economic crises on behalf of peoples needs. The full program is available at http://www.cpusa.org.

A new day is dawning. Our country is at a turning point. This is a time of great possibility. Across the land people are coming together to reshape our nations priorities to make government of by and for the people a reality

A landslide vote on November 4 can open the way to recovery from the very deep wounds of the Bush administration and decades of corporate right wing control.

Working people want bold new policies to end war, restore democratic traditions and create green living wage jobs, affordable housing, health care and quality education for everyone.

Although the ultra-right is weakened and divided they continue to push fear, division, racism and anti-immigrant bigotry in this years elections, aided and abetted by the corporate media. These multipronged poisonous tactics can only be overcome with unbreakable unity

Voters are demanding a new kind of politics to rebuild our country for the common good. A democratic spirit of unity and hope is inspiring millions to get involved.

In 2008 union members, African Americans, Latinos, youth and women, seniors, environmental and peace voters are forging a powerful new all encompassing movement that makes great changes possible.

We offer these proposals as a contribution toward the bold policy changes necessary to meet the immediate needs of working people. Funding to come from monies now being spent on the Iraq war, military budget and tax breaks to the super rich.

1. Immediate Relief:
A moratorium on foreclosures and evictions. Reset mortgages so payments are affordable. No bailouts for banks. Extend unemployment compensation. Increase food stamps, WIC, children’s health insurance and low-income energy assistance. Assist deficit-ridden state and local governments so they can preserve services and jobs. Fund ready to go infrastructure projects

2. A Peacetime, Green Jobs Economy.
Enact massive public works jobs creation. Priority to areas hurt by loss of manufacturing, high unemployment areas including the Katrina devastated Gulf Coast. Major clean, affordable energy development project for solar, wind and biomass electricity generation. Restore Federal energy regulation and encourage public ownership of utilities. Enact the Employee Free Choice Act to enable workers to form unions without intimidation and win higher wages and benefits, dignity and respect.
Enact HR 676 the US National Health insurance Act to provide universal insurance with single payer financing. Fully fund public education. No privatization of Social Security or Medicare. Expand and improve benefits.

3.Restore Civil Rights, the Bill of Rights and Separation of Powers
Restore the civil Rights act enforcement, affirmative action. End the "school to prison pipeline. Pass immigration reform with a path to citizenship. Outlaw hates crimes. Preserve Roe vs. Wade. Repeal the Patriot Act. Prosecute Bush violations of the Constitution. Expand voting rights. Restore the Fairness Doctrine in media

4. Strength through Peace.
Withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq. With no bases or US corporations left behind. Full care for returning veterans. No war on Iran or Afghanistan. Adopt a new foreign policy of diplomacy and respect for all nations. Renew commitment to UN peace role. End trade policies that enrich corporations while destroying jobs. Ratify Kyoto treaty and other climate change agreements. Enforce nuclear non-proliferation, work to abolish nuclear weapons. Cut Pentagon spending in half, close down US bases around the world.

People and Nature Before Profits
Defeating the right wing is the first step in the struggle to end exploitation, poverty, racism and war inherent in capitalism.
Our vision is a socialist USA that opens the way for equality, world peace, real democracy, a society in which people control their own destinies in a sustainable world.

Reaction from South Korea

This is from the Hankyoreh, south Korea's largest liberal/progressive newspaper.

Barack Obama ushers in new progressive era

Eight years of neoconservative policies fade with historic election of the United States’ first African American president

The history of the United States is now divided between pre-Obama and post-Obama.

The seemingly insurmountable barrier of race and the impregnable fortress of neo-conservatism that has controlled U.S. society for the past 30 years have come tumbling down in the face of Barack Hussein Obama. The first African American president produced in 232 years of history and the American voters have ushered in a new age of “neo-progressivism.”

For 30 years, it has been neo-conservative hegemony that has controlled the United States and the world. The election of Ronald Reagan in 1980, sweeping 44 of the nation’s 50 states, was a signal flare for the neo-conservative age. While there was a hiatus in the form of the Clinton era, the two consecutive elections of George W. Bush, who presented a platform of economic policy for the rich and the arrogant foreign policy of a superpower, had many experts declaring the death of progressivism and the eternal triumph of conservatism. The U.S. Democratic Party was mocked as a sterile party unable to rise again. But on Tuesday, American voters lined up for hours in front of voting booths in the darkness of the early morning to make it clear that they want a new future.

Currently in San Francisco as a researcher at the Asia-Pacific Research Center of Stanford University in the United States, People’s Solidarity for Participatory Democracy policy planning committee chair Kim Ki-sik said in a phone interview Tuesday with The Hankyoreh that “the Obama wave has surged in California throughout year. In front of houses and on cars, Obama flags have been waving. There has been an abundance of enthusiasm for making changes through Obama, not mobilized, but voluntary.” Kim also said, “Even if you talk to students at Stanford, which is known as an upper-class school, they all support Obama.”

Neo-conservatism has been the twin of the “neo-liberalist” economy, which went bust in the Wall Street financial crisis. The conservative moment, which has joined with Christian fundamentalism since the late 1960s to seize power in U.S. society, has been the unshaking root supporting these two systems.

Paul Krugman wrote in his book “The Conscience of a Liberal” of how neo-conservatism and neo-liberalism have gotten rid of all government intervention to curb inequality and attempted to turn back time to the period before the New Deal. Grover Norquist, a major figure in neo-conservatism, also declared that he wanted to bring the United States back to the time “up until Teddy Roosevelt, when the socialists took over. The income tax, the death tax, regulation, all that.” With the election of George W. Bush, the conservative movement seized power. Bush was elected president twice, conservatives controlled both houses of the U.S. Congress, and the fear from the 9/11 terrorist attacks was used to declare that the United States had the right to ignore the United Nations and international society and invade nations from Bush’s “axis of evil.”

It did not seem that a progressive age would ever come again. But neo-conservatism has imploded from incompetence, and neo-liberalism from greed. Under George W. Bush’s presidency, the U.S. national debt is approaching US$10 trillion. The surplus left by Bill Clinton has turned into a deficit of close to US$500 billion. In the eight years of the Bush administration, 5 million people have fallen into the poverty class, and the number of Americans without health insurance has increased by 7 million. The average income for CEOs has increased from 30 times the salary of ordinary workers in 1970 to over 300 times that salary today. The Bush administration has threatened the world by applying a Cold War doctrine with a dualistic structure of good and evil to 21st century society.

Just as Franklin D. Roosevelt opened up a “progressive age” in the 1930s after the Great Depression shattered the Gilded Age of the law of the jungle, Obama too has greeted the dawn of a “new progressive age” with the Wall Street financial crisis symbolizing the failure of neo-liberalism.

Obama, who campaigned for the poor in Chicago and opposed the Iraq War, made it clear in his election campaign that he would pursue a taxation policy with a distribution that lowers taxes for the poor and collects more from the rich. In his victory speech on Tuesday, he cited the New Deal and spoke of the progress of history. He also professed a new foreign policy of tolerance, saying that he would meet with enemies as well as friends to conduct dialogue. The world now has high hopes for a “less arrogant America.” An editorial in Great Britain’s Guardian newspaper declared, “Obama is America’s hope and our hope.”

It may not seem real yet, but today we witnessed a moment of history being rewritten.

Please direct questions or comments to [englishhani@hani.co.kr]

Trumka’s Straight Talk on Race Helped Win Blue Collar Union Vote

Kudos from Daily Kos to AFL-CIO's Richard Trumka. Always good for labor to get recognition outside the labor movement.

http://blog.aflcio.org/2008/11/07/kudos-to-afl-cio-secretary-treasurer-trumka/

People power on the march

What a beautiful sight it has been to see the hundreds of volunteers in my little city over the past few days, young and old, perched in corners on folding chairs, sitting on the floor, in any nook or cranny, using cell phones or landlines, calling voters across the nation to vote to TURN OUR COUNTRY AROUND - peace, unity, stop the hate and slime, put people before corporate greed. This morning I spent an hour phonecalling voters in the Old Dominion state - in fact in the former capital of the Confederacy, Richmond - reminding them to vote and where to vote. Around me were over a hundred folks doing the same. It's been a steady stream of volunteers of all ages, I'd say the majority women - a strong rejection of the repulsive Sarah Palin. Enthused, energized and ready to move ahead to build for progressive change in our country.

Here's a video for today - people power on the move:

9,000 maniacs - braving rain, wind and mud to be part of something bigger

The flavor of what it's all about, from Philadelphia Daily News reporter/blogger Will Bunch:

You would have thought for a minute that Bud Selig -- on some bizarre whim -- had announced that he wanted to wrap up the World Series right into the very worst of Mother Nature's Octoberfest here in the Philadelphia area, and to prove his arbitrary nature had also decided to do so not at Citizens Bank Park but on a mud-soaked college quad 20 minutes away. It would be hard to imagine what else -- besides a Phillies world championship -- could draw so many people on a day when rain poured down in chilly sheets, as wind whipped off the Delaware River and the thermometer struggled to stay above 40.

Nobody had to be there on an ungodly day -- but here they were, 9,000 maniacs, lined up around the entire south side of the Widener University campus in Chester, rounding a corner with no end in site, all awaiting admission to a mud-soaked field with no shelter from the elements, all to hear a 25-minute speech by the Democrat who wants to be the next president of the United States. As the growing, mostly young throng sunk into mud that was more than ankle deep in spots, it was a little like Woodstock without the three days of music or the brown acid.

Barackstock.

and

For a political junkie. the color of such an unusual event outweighed the words -- the eerie glow of the TV lights and the swirl of tiny leaves in their hot glow, as Obama spoke in a black windbreaker and jeans. occasionally competing with howling wind and what sounded like far-off thunder. Unintentionally, perhaps, the energy of the event was a powerful contrast with the news that John McCain and Sarah Palin had canceled an event just an hour away in Quakertown because of bad weather.

The real stars were the people, and their determination of these 9,000 to be there on such a raw and miserable day, to be a part of something bigger than themselves. ...

Some writers have called the enthusiasm for Obama a cult (like ABC's Jake Tapper, who was covering the rally) -- and the 9,000 fanatics may well find come next winter that the subject of their enthusiasm is just another politician who can't deliver all the change he has promised, especially in the face of an economic downturn that is more soaking than the rains over Delaware County.

Maybe so, but in an unforgettable October here in Philadelphia, the fact that thousands of people want so desperately to be a part of something that they think might change this country, regardless of how Obama the man turns out, is, in and of itself, something to be hopeful about, especially on a such a gray and bitter morning.

Read it all here.

‘Just your average Joe’

‘Just your average Joe’
Joe Biden pays visit to the Ohio State University-Newark

By Jonny Lippincott

NEWARK, Ohio—Democratic vice- presidential candidate Joe Biden paid a visit to this working class town Oct. 15. Biden delivered a speech to a packed house at the Ohio State University and Central Ohio Technical College Adena Hall.

Newark, Ohio is a small community located about 40 miles east of Columbus. The town has been suffering economic hardships from foreclosed homes, loss of small businesses to layoffs from major manufacturers such as Owens Corning, Diebold and Holophane lighting solutions. Newark has also experienced massive job outsourcing due to jobs being pushed out of town and forcing many residence to commute to major cities for employment.

Thus, a visit from the self proclaimed "poorest senator" seemed like a ray of hope to a near dying community. Among the people attending the rally were everyone from the old to the young and many representatives of the working class including steelworkers, fire and policemen, medical workers, small business owners and so forth. It was with out a doubt that the majority of the crowd was young people thirsty for change from the direction our country is headed in.

The overall atmosphere of the event seemed more like a rock concert or a major sporting event then a political rally. To start things off, Ohio State Treasurer and Attorney General candidate Richard Cordray and Gov. Ted Strickland got the crowd fired up talking about how important of a role the state of Ohio will play in this most important presidential election.

When Biden began his speech, he began talking about his hometown in Delaware and the similarities to Newark. He said, "The American people feel it all over, people are sitting at their kitchen tables and having a conversation as ordinary and as profound as 'Will we have a job next month?'"

Biden also touched on the fact that America's progress will not be measured by the stock market or by the salaries of big business CEOs but by parents’ ability to tell their children everything will be fine in the end.

It seemed the people of Newark felt relieved when the labor issues of the times were mentioned and that someone is willing to solve the problem instead of cower from the true war being waged against the American people, the war of job loss, outsourcing, foreclosure, predatory lending, and the decline of small business.

After McCain said "that one," it was over

I admit John McCain started out pretty good in the debate. Wow, I thought, a town hall format really is his strong point. But after 30 minutes, I realized this whole campaign -- the debate, the presidency, everything -- is a marathon, not a sprint. McCain does not have the stamina. Barack Obama does and he clearly won this Town Hall debate. And in the process sewed up the election by any stretch of political imagination.

McCain created the momentum early on with his $350 billion taxpayer bailout of distressed homeowners. Pretty bold, I thought. (I also thought the far right is having a fit right now.) Obama was wobbly in his early response and especially specifics.

Can't remember if it was the question about "sacrifice" or before that but around that time Obama began to turn things around. And McCain -- sorry -- was just a cranky, grumpy old man. The icing on the cake was when he called Obama "that one!" (racial dynamics and all...) Like he was an object, not a human being. Ohhh. That reverberated around a million homes! How many people at their work, by their bosses or supervisors have been called "that one?" Millions. It's belittling and embarrassing. And that is what McCain promises for the American people.

On green jobs and health care Obama hit solidly the questions pitched to him. But suprisingly, he knocked it out on foreign policy -- supposedly his "weak" point. Starting with the illegal war in Iraq and McCain's support for it, Obama railed on the cost in treasure, lives and relationships around the world.

I channeled my 79 year old mom who died five years ago. She -- like my dad -- are classic Reagan Democrats. And, I concluded after the channeling, that she would vote for Obama. It's like being presented a door to the hopeful future or the horrid past. My mom was alway a pragmatist. Hopeful future? Horrid past? Hmmm the devil is known, I'll take the future she'd say.

It's obvious that working class, democratic forces must still press their agenda after Nov. 4. But won't it be different when there is an ally in the White House! This debate sealed it. Obama won -- and will win -- significantly.

Win to Obama

Barack Obama looked presidential and in command of the facts. But the chattering classes will parse this for forever. Here are some insightful comments:

Pelham

Sep 27 08, 2:50am (about 2 hours ago)

Not sure at which point I'll switch to Law and Order SVU. Oooh looks like it'll be very soon. McCain just can't look at Obama - so rude. Or is he frantically checking his notes or trying to keep his false teeth from flopping out.

Comments from Wash Post:

polls are showing Obama won...even among women and the over 55 crowd. huge win.

Palin/Biden should be another win if Biden keeps feet out of mouth.
Posted by: wpost4112 | September 26, 2008 11:59

All CNN AUDIENCE POLLS HAVE OBAMA WINNING THE DEBATE ON ALL TOPICS DISCUSSED.

Posted by: MILLER123 | September 26, 2008 11:58 PM |

It seems to me that Obama won by a nose. i agree that he wiped up on the economy.

McCain had some good points towards the end, but he hurt himself by being snide, by his sneering expression, and by his failure to ever look at Obama.

Frankly, it made me notice that McCain is shorter and older. And that he seems to have a perspective at least 20 years out of date.

Posted by: thaimex | September 26, 2008 11:58 PM |

Some comments on "The Fix":
- McCain's grin was scary.
- McCain's absolute inability and avoidance of Obama - refuse to address him by name and refuse to look him in the eye - smacked of disrespect at best and possibly other...motives at worst.
- Obama was right about Kissinger's stance on no preconditions. McCain was again mischaracterizing or outright lying.
- The lasting image most voters have is of McCain kissing George's a-- in 2004 so he'd have Rove and the money at his disposal in 2008.

Posted by: paulaann25 | September 26, 2008 11:58 PM

Wow! I was surprised at Obama's performance.

I'm a delegate to the Republican convention - started re-thinking McCain when he picked inexperienced Palin - and frankly, Obama was the greater statesman tonight.

Worst of all, McCain sounded like an old man talking about the past.

Posted by: DenverVoter | September 26, 2008 11:57 PM

McCain runnning for cover on financial crisis

A couple of good commentaries to note:

Harold Meyerson writes in the Washington Post about "McCain's Ploy":

Slipping in the polls? Concerned that Americans may be paying more attention to the declining economy -- and even supporting economic regulation again -- than to your own stellar leadership abilities?

What's a Republican presidential nominee to do?

If you're named John McCain, the answer became apparent yesterday afternoon -- make the solution to the economic crisis all about you. Suspend your campaign. Pull out of tomorrow's debate -- a trivial exercise merely allowing Americans to judge the two candidates side by side. Change the terms of the nation's economic discussion from the course we should take, and the defects of the laissez-faire model that got us here, to the indispensability of John McCain, leader of leaders.

In the Wall Street Journal piece titled "It's Judgment Day for McCain," Thomas Frank suggests that McCain has "a special advantage to bring" to any investigation of Wall Street practices:

many of the relevant witnesses are friends or colleagues of his. In fact, he can probably get to the bottom of the whole mess just by cross-examining the people riding on his campaign bus.

A number of progressive groups are organizing rallies today around the country, calling it a national day of action on the theme "Congress must fix the mess created by Wall Street. But the right way. NOT by a no-strings-attached $700 billion handout." Check here to see the organizations involved and find an event in your area.

And Working America, the community affiliate of the AFL-CIO, has put up an action page where you can send a message to your member of Congress and congressional leaders and tell them "No blank checks for Wall Street."

Machinists union stands up to right-wing/media b-s

A major national political development took place on Monday in Florida. The 2,600 delegates to the International Association of Machinists convention enthusiastically voted to endorse Barack Obama for president of the United States. They set in motion a major on-the-ground election effort in key battleground states like Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

This move by the nation’s second largest industrial union — those famous blue-collar voters the Republican right and the corporate media have been voicing oh so much concern about — came despite a week of assault by the very same Republican far-right embodied in the McCain/Palin campaign, with a cowed corporate media largely following their script.

The IAM had backed Hillary Clinton, and during the primaries IAM President Tom Buffenbarger made some over-the-top comments. Yet, this week, he and this 700,000-member blue collar union took their stand based on the nitty gritty of what is at stake for America’s working class in this election. It was a significant rejection of all the b-s the anti-worker, anti-family, anti-women, anti-democracy McCain-Palin campaign is spewing.

Yet a Google search today turned up barely a word about this in the corporate media.
Aside from our newspaper, you have to go to the Machinists web site to get any information about it.

Likewise, Hillary Clinton’s rousing speech to that convention, and her campaign tour of Florida, drew skimpy and tepid coverage in the corporate media.

The IAM notes that:

The packed convention hall rose to their feet repeatedly during Clinton's remarks and displayed unequivocal support for her request to back the candidacy of Illinois Senator Barack Obama.

"You were with me from the start, and I want you to know that I will stand with you as we try to change what's going on in this country," Clinton told the delegates. "I believe this country is worth fighting for, and that's why I am fighting to elect Barack Obama the next president of the United States.

"I don't think there's ever been higher stakes in an election than what we're facing this November. Barack and I may have started on different paths, but we are on one journey now, and it's a journey to take back our country because Americans do better when we have a Democratic president," declared Clinton.

"I know Senator Obama. I've seen his passion and determination. He understands both the economic stresses here at home and the strategic challenges around the world," said Clinton. "We've got to start with a president who actually understands the changes we have to make. And no one has more at stake in this election than the American labor movement."

Immediately following her remarks, delegates unanimously passed a resolution endorsing Barack Obama for president. "This union is not half-hearted with its endorsements," said IAM President Tom Buffenbarger, who was an early and strong supporter of Sen. Clinton in the primary race. "We will have boots on the ground in every state to make sure our members understand that Barack Obama is the best chance in a generation to reclaim the American Dream for working families."

The endorsement of Obama will trigger a massive education campaign among IAM members and extensive publicity in union publications and worksites nationwide. The IAM is a significant political presence in the key industrial states of Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin.

Kim Gandy: not all women...

Well said by NOW's Kim Gandy

http://www.now.org/press/08-08/08-29.html

Confront racism, leader tells union

This just in from Gary Hicks in Boston...Right on! Labor is really taking this head on and getting a good response to it.


Confront racism, leader tells union
Issue shadows campaign for Obama, Haynes contends

By Maria Sacchetti, Globe Staff September 2, 2008

The state's top union leader, concerned that some white voters will not vote for Barack Obama because he is black, issued an impassioned plea to union members yesterday to confront racism on the campaign trail.
Speaking to politicians and pipefitters alike, Massachusetts AFL-CIO president Robert Haynes brought the audience to its feet at the Greater Boston Central Labor Council's annual Labor Day breakfast. He surprised many union members by delivering an unusually direct speech on the sensitive issue of racism, echoing concerns from other union leaders nationwide.
"Barack Obama's skin color isn't what matters in this election," Haynes told more than 350 people who gathered for bacon and eggs at the Park Plaza Hotel in Boston. "I'll be damned, and I know you'll be damned, if I let racism . . . scare this country into voting for John McCain." Haynes followed US Senator John Kerry, Mayor Thomas M. Menino, and union leaders who also urged workers to vote and campaign for Obama, citing the urgency of the election and the fact that Democrats have lost the last two presidential contests.
Only Haynes raised the issue of racism directly.
Haynes said he decided to confront racism head-on because he had been hearing racist comments about Obama - some subtle, some overt - in restaurants and mechanics' garages across Massachusetts. Recently on the Cape, for instance, an elderly man busing tables suggested that he would not vote for Obama and referred to black colleagues as "those people." In another case, he said, car mechanics who normally voted Democrat said they would not support Obama because he is black.
Haynes said he gave his speech because he wanted to give union members something to say in response to racism on the campaign trail. Yesterday, he told union members they could emphasize the economy and workers' rights. They could point out that black union members have been voting for white Democrats for president all their lives.
When all else fails, he said, make voters see the shame in racism.
"You've got to look them dead in the eye," he said. "Can you imagine telling your kid in this day and age that you're not going to vote for someone because of the color of their skin?"
Nationally, other union leaders have raised concerns about racism hurting Obama among working-class white people. The national AFL-CIO endorsed Obama in June and launched a multimillion-dollar campaign to urge people to vote for him.
Making the point is crucial now, Haynes said, as dozens of union members flock to New Hampshire and other swing states to campaign for Obama. Massachusetts unions could have a key influence on New Hampshire voters, he said; about 10,000 of New Hampshire's 40,000 union members work in Massachusetts.
Haynes said he had never given such a speech before - even when Deval Patrick, Massachusetts' first black governor, was running for the seat.
Haynes's speech inspired many in the crowd.
"I don't think racism should be the point of the election," said Arthur Johnson, a 52-year-old security guard from Revere who is white.
Lauren Jacobs, organizing director of the Local SEIU 615, said union members who are campaigning in New Hampshire are emphasizing the issues that Obama shares with all voters. Obama is the son of a single mother, she said, and he struggled to put himself through college, something that resonates with voters.
"People really connect with this guy," she said.
Haynes said racism was prevalent everywhere, not just in the unions, although he did not think that most voters were racist. Still, he said he decided to make it a major issue because even a small number rejecting Obama because of his race could hurt his chances.
"We can't afford to have this guy lose the presidency because of unspoken truths," he said afterward. Haynes represents 400,000 union members in Massachusetts.
After the speech, union members, white and black, approached Haynes to shake his hand, slap him on the shoulder, and thank him for his speech.
David Eastmond of Boston, an iron worker for more than 30 years, said he hoped union leaders would share the speech across the United States.
"As an African American, I've been voting . . . for white presidents all my life," he said. "When the tables are turned, we've got a good candidate. Why can't we vote for him?"

On Hillary supporters and PUMA

The media is going crazy over the Hillary Clinton supporters vs. reality -- meaning that Barack Obama is going to be nominated. Here's my take on it.

I was at a Denver event celebrating the 88 years since women won the vote. The place was packed with older and younger women either in Denver for the DNC or supporters who live in Colorado. I talked to staunch Hillary supporters but the overwhelming majority of the hundreds and hundreds of women who were there were behind Barack Obama.

Yet the women I did talk to who were Hillary delegates -- from Ohio and Kentucky, both Clinton states -- were pretty adamant: They weren't happy about the pending Obama nomination and they weren't going out of their way to work for him.

All these women were white.

In one conversation the women from Ohio claimed that Hillary had brought out the Republicans and Independents in their rock red county and now these voters are going to McCain.

A former New Yorker, turned Coloradan who was a member of the Colorado State Assembly overhearing this conversation, interjected with a New York-Western attitude, "I don't believe it."

This shook these Buckeyes up and they said they were really going to work for Obama but they didn't think he'd win Ohio. "I don't believe it" this seasoned Coloradan elected official said.

Then a boisterous group of women from Kentucky wearing "Pitch Mitch" paraphanalia walked in. Knowing that Republican Mitch McConnell is in trouble for his Senate seat, I wanted to talk to them.

Well I got an earful. "Obama missed a great opportunity when he didn't pick Hillary for vice president. It could have united the party." On and on they told me how upset they still are. How unappreciated they felt. How they weren't into working for an Obama election. "Now don't get me wrong. I've been a Democrat all my life." But they were putting their all into "Pitching Mitch."

"Do you know anything about this lawsuit to prevent Obama from becoming the nominee?" I asked. The woman's face lit up. "Yeah," she blurted out. "The lawsuit was filed for a temporary restraining order but the judge denied it." Then her face changed. And she said, "No, I'm not a part of it." And our animated conversation came to an end.

I was really pondering this phenomena. Could there be women that felt so strongly about a woman president, and Hillary herself, that they are so hurt that they can't really "move on?"

I was feeling a bit foreign from these Hillary feminists. How could they not be worried about a John McCain election? How could they not be working their butts off to prevent McCain, who has a terrible record for women's rights -- declaring himself against pay equity and reproductive rights?

Then another woman came up to me and whispered: They are PUMAs.

"What is PUMA?" I asked.

"Party Unity My Ass" she said.

Hmmm, I thought. Then afterwards it dawned on me. It was history repeating. When the women's rights and abolitionist movement clashed in the 1800s it was ugly. What I read was lots of ugly, racist opinions trying to bolster the women's rights cause. The movement was too young and immature to realize you can't use racism, or be influenced by racism, to bolster another struggle for rights. It just doesn't work.

There are all sorts of people in the Democratic Party, including those influenced by racism, or those who don't want to struggle with their friends and neighbors on the issue. So instead of coming to grip with reality and fighting, these women have chosen to drop out or complain. And objectively that means McCain could win and set back women's rights 100 years. Racism does not advance women's rights.

As I heard a progressive congresswoman say to those who weren't happy about John Kerry: Just get over it!

These women are -- I'm estimating -- no more than 20 percent of the Democratic electorate. But in a tight race that's a lot! What could drive the thinking of such voters. I don't think it can be sugar-coated. It's racism. That's what distorts people from voting for their self-interest. I'm so grateful for the labor movement which has decided to take on the issue head on.

There will always be those who look for the easy way out. The non-struggle path. But as Frederick Douglass once said, Power cedes nothing without struggle, it never has and it never will.

So PUMAs -- do you really want four more years of Bush? If not, then struggle.

Thoughtful piece on progressives and Obama

Obama: Transformational President or Another Disappointment?

    'Whether he wins or loses, the vast movement
    inspired by Obama will become the next generation
    of American social activists'

By Tom Hayden
18 August 2008

http://theragblog.blogspot.com/2008/08/tom-hayden-on-obama-transformational.html


Barack Obama, it is true, is a transformational leader.
But he needs a transformational movement to become a
transformational president.

He is transformational not only by his charisma and
brilliance, but by embodying the possibility of an
African-American being chosen president in the
generation following the civil-rights movement. Whether
he wins or loses, the vast movement inspired by Obama
will become the next generation of American social
activists.

For many Americans, the possibility of Obama is a
deeply personal one. I mean here the mythic Obama who
exists in our imaginations, not the literal Obama whose
centrist positions will disappoint many progressives.

My wife and I have an adopted eight-year old "biracial"
boy whose roots are African-American. My adult son is
married to an African-American woman with roots in
Jamaica and Costa Rica. Our family is part of the
globalized generation Obama represents. What is at
stake for our kids' future is real, palpable, not only
political. Their future will very much be shaped by the
outcome of this election. Millions of people in this
country-and around the world-feel similarly affected.

Myths are all-important, as Obama writes in his Dreams
from My Father. Fifty years ago, the mythic Obama
existed only as an aspiration, an ideal, in a country
where interracial love was taboo and interracial
marriage was largely banned. In 1960, in my liberal
community of Ann Arbor, Michigan, our student newspaper
exposed the University of Michigan's dean of women for
secretly spying on white coeds seen having coffee with
black men in the campus Union and notifying their
parents. In those days, too, the vision of an African-
American as president was preserved only in a dream
state. As Obama himself declared on the night of the
Iowa primary, "Some said this night would never come."

The early civil-rights movement, the jazz musicians,
and the Beat poets dreamed up this mythic Obama before
the literal Obama could materialize. His African father
and white countercultural mother dared to dream and
love him into existence, incarnate him, at the creative
moment of the historic march on Washington. Only the
overthrow of Jim Crow segregation then opened space for
the dream to rise politically.

This collapse was not an engineering feat, like a
bridge falling, but the consequence of suffering and
martyrdom along with countless invisible feats of
organization in the American South.

If this sounds unscientific or, as some would say,
cultish, think about it. None of the supposedly expert
people in the political, media or intellectual
establishments saw this day coming. I didn't expect it
myself, the news was carried to me by a new generation,
including my own grown-up children. It was dreamed up
and built "beyond the radar" or "outside the box" by
experienced dreamers with long histories in community
organizing, social movements, and not a few lost
causes. They were sustained by the stones the builders
left out, the movement, "calloused hand by calloused
hand," that Obama refers to.

In one of his best oratorical moments, Obama summons
the spirit of social movements that were built from the
bottom up, from the Revolutionary War to the
abolitionist crusade to the women's suffrage cause to
the eight-hour day and the rights of labour, ending
with the time of his birth when the walls came down in
Selma and Montgomery, Alabama, and Delano, California.

As he repeats this mantra of movements thousands of
times to millions of Americans, a new cultural
understanding becomes possible. This is the foundation
of a new American story that is badly needed, one that
attributes whatever is great about this country to the
ghosts of those who came before, in social movements
from the margins.

Although Howard Zinn may not agree, Obama to a large
degree has appropriated Zinn's "people's history" model
of America as against the conservative narrative that
glorifies wars against alien savages as necessary to
forge a new democracy in the wilderness, the unbroken
story of American exceptionalism, from the colonial
forests to the Iraqi deserts, from Custer to McCain.
Obama's emerging narrative also includes but supercedes
the other major explanation of American specialness,
the narrative of the "melting pot," by noting that
whatever "melting" did occur was always in the face of
massive and entrenched opposition from the privileged.

I have met John McCain, and I happen to like him as an
earthy sort of guy. But I am constantly aware that he
bombed Vietnam at least 25 times before being shot down
in a war that never should have been fought, in a
defeat that still cannot say its name. He wants to
continue the unwinnable Iraq war, costing 10 billion
dollars per month, until every suspect Iraqi is dead,
wounded or detained, even though our military tactics
keep causing more young Iraqis to hate us than ever
before.

As if fighting the war on terrorism until the end of
terrorism isn't enough for him, McCain wants to
reignite the Cold War until the Russians are forever
broken and humiliated. The vanguard for the anti-
Russian offensive has been Georgia, a stronghold of the
neoconservative lobby and, incidentally, a cash cow for
McCain's own foreign-policy adviser Randy Scheunemann,
who made hundreds of thousands of dollars working as a
lobbyist for the country before joining McCain's
campaign team. By supporting Georgia's impractical
attempts to seize the breakaway areas of South Ossetia
and Abkhazia, McCain has abetted another unnecessary
war he cannot win.

This inability to limit the adventurist appetite for
war is the most dangerous element of the McCain and
Republican world view. It is paralleled, of course, by
their inability to limit the corporate appetite for an
unregulated market economy. In combination, the brew is
an economy directed to the needs of the country-club
rich, the oil companies, and military contractors.

A form of crony capitalism slouches forward in place of
either competitive markets or state regulation. The
McCain future will be one of circling the wagons around
the five percent who own 40 percent of the planet's
resources against the 95 percent who live vulnerable
lives under our web of empire. To nail down this
future, McCain has pledged to nominate Supreme Court
candidates approved by the far right.

And yet McCain has a good chance, the best chance among
Republicans, of winning in November. He has Gen.
Eisenhower's war-hero persona. It is a dangerous world
out there. He appeals to those whose idea of the future
is more of the past, buying time against the
inevitable. And McCain is running against Barack Obama,
who threatens our institutions and culture simply by
representing the unexpected and unauthorized future.

My prediction: If he continues on course, Obama will
win the popular vote by a few percentage points in
November, but is at serious risk in the Electoral
College. The institution rooted in the original slavery
compromise may be a barrier too great to overcome.

The priority for Obama supporters has to be
mobilization of new, undecided, and independent voters
in up-for- grabs states like Pennsylvania, Ohio,
Michigan, while expanding the Electoral College
delegates in places like New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada
and possibly Virginia. Unlike the nadir of 2000, when
Al Gore and the institutional Democrats seemed unable
to mount a resistance, another Electoral College loss
should trigger an unrelenting and forceful democracy
movement against the Electoral College and other
institutional chains on the right to know, vote, and
participate.

There are many outside the Obama movement who assert
that the candidate is "not progressive enough", that
Obama will be co-opted as a new face for American
interventionism, that in any event real change cannot
be achieved from the top down.

These criticisms are correct. But in the end, they miss
the larger point.

The network www.progressivesforobama.blogspot.com/ is
the site to visit for those who want to share and
explore these concerns in depth, while still wanting to
help the Obama movement win. Most of us want President
Obama to withdraw troops from Iraq more rapidly than in
16 months. But it is important that Obama's position is
shared by Iraq's prime minister and the vast majority
of both our people. The Iraqi regime, pressured by its
own people, has rejected the White House and McCain's
refusal to adopt a timetable.

The real problem with Obama's position on Iraq is his
adherence to the outmoded Baker-Hamilton proposal to
leave thousands of American troops behind for training,
advising and ill-defined "counterterrorism" operations.
Obama should be pressured to reconsider this recipe for
a low-visibility counterinsurgency quagmire.

On Iran, Obama has usefully emphasized diplomacy as the
only path to manage the bilateral crisis and assure the
possibility of orderly withdrawal from Iraq. He should
be pressed to resist any escalation. On Afghanistan,
Obama has proposed transferring 10,000 American combat
troops from Iraq, which means out of the frying pan,
into the fire. A July 28 Time magazine cover story by
Rory Stewart rejects such thinking: "A troop increase
is likely to inflame Afghan nationalism because Afghans
are more anti-foreign than we acknowledge and the
support for our presence in the insurgency areas is
declining." Obama should accept this advice.

Pakistan, and the possibility of a ground invasion by
Afghan and U.S. troops, could be Obama's Bay of Pigs, a
debacle. On Israel-Palestine, he will pursue diplomacy
more aggressively, but little more. Altogether, the
counterinsurgencies in Iraq, Afghanistan, and Pakistan
are likely to become a spreading global quagmire and a
human-rights nightmare, nullifying the funding
prospects for health-care reform or other domestic
initiatives.

In Latin America, Obama supports the Colombian
military, riddled with drug lords, against the Columbia
guerrillas, with ties of their own to narco
trafficking. Beyond that, he has been out of step and
out of touch with the winds of democratic change
sweeping Latin America. His commitment to fulfilling
the United Nations anti-poverty goals, or to
eradicating sweatshops through a global living wage, is
underwhelming and-given his anti-terrorism wars-will be
underfinanced.

And so on. The man will disappoint as well as inspire.

Once again, then, why support him by knocking on doors,
sending money, monitoring polling places, getting our
hopes up? There are three reasons that stand out in my
mind. First, American progressives, radicals, and
populists need to be part of the vast Obama coalition,
not perceived as negative do-nothings in the minds of
the young people and African-Americans at the center of
the organized campaign. It is not a "lesser evil" for
anyone of my generation's background to send an
African- American Democrat to the White House. Pressure
from supporters of Obama is more effective than
pressure from critics who don't care much if he wins
and won't lift a finger to help him.

Second, his court appointments will keep us from a
right-wing lock on social, economic and civil-liberties
issues during our lifetime. Third, we all can chew gum
and walk at the same time; that is, it should be no
problem to vote for Obama and picket his White House
when justified.

Obama himself says he has solid progressive roots but
that he intends to campaign and govern from the centre.
(He has said he is neither a "Scoop" Jackson Democrat
nor a Tom Hayden Democrat.) That is a challenge to rise
up, organize, and reshape the centre, and build a
climate of public opinion so intense that it becomes
necessary to redeploy from military quagmires, take on
the unregulated corporations and uncontrolled global
warming, and devote resources to domestic priorities
like health care, the green economy, and inner-city
jobs for youth.

What is missing in the current equation is not a
capable and enlightened centrist but a progressive
social movement on a scale like those of the past.

The refrain is familiar. Without the militant
abolitionists, including the Underground Railroad and
John Brown, there would have been no pressure on
President Lincoln and no black troops for the South.
Without the radicals of the 1930s, there would have
been no pressure on President Franklin Roosevelt, no
New Deal, no Wagner Act, no Social Security. Without
the civil-rights and peace movements pressuring
President John Kennedy, there would have been no march
on Washington and no proposal to reverse the nuclear-
arms race.

It is true that these radical reforms were limited and
gradually weakened, but there is no evidence to suggest
that if radicals had abstained from mainstream
electoral politics that deeper reforms or revolution
would have resulted.

The creative tension between large social movements and
enlightened Machiavellian leaders is the historical
model that has produced the most important reforms in
the course of American history.

Mainstream political leaders will not move to the left
of their own base. There are no shortcuts to radical
change without a powerful and effective constituency
organized from the bottom up. The next chapter in
Obama's new American story remains to be written,
perhaps by the most visionary of his own supporters.

His own movement will have to pull him towards full
withdrawal from Iraq, or the regulation of the great
financial power centres, instead of waiting for him to
lead. Already among his elite caste of fund-raisers,
there is more interest in his position on the capital-
gains tax than holding Halliburton accountable. And his
"cast of 300" national security advisers, according to
The New York Times, "fall well within centrist
Democratic foreign policy thinking".

Progressives need to unite for Barack Obama but also
unite-organically at least, not in a top-down way-on
issues like peace, the environment, the economy, media
reform, campaign finance and equality like never
before. The growing conflict today is between democracy
and empire, and the battlefronts are many and often
confusing. Even the Bush years have failed to unite
American progressives as effectively as occurred during
Vietnam. There is no reason to expect a President
McCain to unify anything more than our manic
depression.

But there is the improbable hope that the movement set
ablaze by the Obama campaign will be enough to elect
Obama and a more progressive Congress in November,
creating an explosion of rising expectations for social
movements-here and around the world-that President
Obama will be compelled to meet in 2009.

That is a moment to live and fight for.

[Tom Hayden is a lifelong peace and human-rights
activist, former California legislator, professor, and
author of more than 15 books.]

McCain: Gimme shelter...how many?

Well, I'm glad this stuff is finally getting attention. NY Times Frank Rich was right...McCain is the candidate that nobody knows.

Aug. 22, 2008

Most of us regular folks know how many homes we own--none or one
(http://www.unionvoice.org/ct/Od1d1L41rPH6/). But Sen. John
McCain has so many places he can call home--from ranches to
beachfront condos--he can't remember how many homes he owns. He
had to assign a staffer to figure it out. Wow. It's not like
forgetting how many pairs of socks you own. But with 10 houses
and condos, maybe McCain owns more homes than some of us have
socks. Talk about elite and out of touch.

Good one, Mary Mitchell

From Chicago's own Sun Times columnist...good one from Mary Mitchell.

Latest smear against Obama an abomination
Book exploits racial fears, hate in effort to scare white America
http://www.suntimes.com/news/mitchell/1107452,CST-NWS-mitch14.article

Summer camp: Getting out the youth vote

Thirty youth from around the country attend the first day of the Summer Youth Elections Camp in St Louis, sponsored by the YCL and the Youth Voter Collective. Many participants are the children of area union members.

McCain out of step with women

Listen to the Center for American Progress' conversation on John McCain, women voters and issues. Exposes that John McCain is NOT a moderate.

http://websrvr80il.audiovideoweb.com/il80web20037/dia/John/06-11-08%20McCain%20Record%20on%20Women%20with%20Emilys%20List%20and%20Rep.%20DWS.mp3

Here's an interesting report on the same topic:

But there is something that really turns me off to a title that says: "Not What Women Want" and it's written by two guys! The subtitle "Impact of John McCain's Policy on America's Women" is much better.

http://thinkprogress.org/wonkroom/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/womens_paper.pdf